Mrs. Malony drew the blind a little way down, then left the room. She stole downstairs on tiptoe. Maggie was there, keeping house.
"Go up," said Mrs. Malony, "as quate as a weasel, and sit by your mother till I come back."
Poor Maggie had been crying, but she now did as she was told.
Mrs. Malony went straight to her cupboard, now her clothes-cupboard, and very soon made up a bundle.
"Och and och," she said to herself, "they won't go far at all, at all."
They were the woman's Sunday clothes for all that, and she meant to take them to the poor man's banker at the sign of the three golden balls.
Then her eyes fell upon her stubby left hand.
"Set you up wid a gold ring indade, Mrs. Malony," she said, "when a brass one would do for a toime! Ill-luck? I won't belave it."
A tear fell on the ring nevertheless, for it brought back memories of happy days of the half-forgotten past. No wonder then she sighed as she screwed it off.
"You've been crying, Mrs. Malony," said the burly pawnbroker as she laid the ring on the counter.